Seattle keeping bus-only lanes downtown

Only buses will be allowed to drive a downtown stretch of Third Avenue during peak hours even after the renovated Seattle Transit Tunnel reopens in September, Mayor Greg Nickels announced Friday.

The tunnel is scheduled to reopen Monday, Sept. 24. Eighteen bus routes are moving into the tunnel, and Metro is reorganizing other bus routes on surface streets to further improve mobility through downtown.

“With tunnel work coming to an end, this is a tremendous opportunity to improve transit service downtown and help people get where they are going quickly and efficiently,” Mayor Greg Nickels said in a prepared statement Friday.

The bus tunnel was closed September 2005 while Sound Transit retrofits it for use by both buses and light rail beginning in 2009.

King County Executive Ron Sims said in that statement: “I applaud the mayor’s decision. It is increasing our bus capacity at a time when demand for more transit service is on the rise. During the tunnel closure we’ve actually increased downtown ridership by 10,000 boardings.”

A recent report by Metro found operating Third Avenue as a bus-only corridor during peak commute hours (6-9 a.m. and 3-6:30 p.m.) helped traffic move more efficiently, according to the mayor’s office.